Nothing To Do With Your History, Sir
by Sors
Summary: Sephiroth runs across Zack only a year before the War starts, but the friendship they form then will last them until the worst of times. An orginal run though of Zack and Seph's first missions.
1. Reactor Incident

**Nothing To Do With Your History, Sir. **

**Chapter 1**

Zack wiped a drop of blood from the side of his cheek and turned back to look at Sephiroth. The man looked horrible, far worse then Zack could have ever imagined. His right arm hung limply at his side, a spiral of blood trickled down the fingers in his ripped gloves before dripping to the ground. A twisted metal chuck stuck out from just below his ribs, and his left hand supported that as best he could.

For a moment Zack wondered how Sephiroth could ever possibly have ended up in this situation.

How any of them had ever wound up here.

He flicked his sword, the Amerirose, to clean it of blood from the mako enhanced monsters. Up ahead a few more of the cautious animals lurked. They seemed to almost communicate with each other through body language. Plotting, surely, to again advantage of their new prey. Zack sighed and pulled his own ShinRa Soldier cloak closer towards him. It might only be fall, but just south of the Northern Glacier everything was frozen solid.

Making a mako reactor here was the worst idea that bitch Scarlet ever managed.

Sephiroth inched closer to Zack, careful to give him enough distance incase the monsters ahead attacked.

"We'll be fine." Zack replied to Sephiroth's unspoken worries.

Sephiroth's only reply was an almost uncharacteristic snort.

Zack finally decided that waiting for the damn beasts to attack would be useless, they'd freeze before the monster did. He raised one of his gloved hands, pummeled the snow around the beasts with fire magic, and rushed forward. The first of the three went down in an easy slice. The second raised it's human like arm to block the Amerirose, and swung it's other crystallized arm forward. Zack was forced to release and take an underhanded swing into the beast's gut. Steaming blood poured out and he moved onto the last of the creatures. This one sprung back several times showing an amazing amount of agility.

"Clever." Zack commented, and then struck hard at where he expected the critter's head to move. In an instant it changed direction and swung back with it's length arms. Zack's right shoulder took most of impact, and his armor there managed to protect him long enough to heft the sword back up and across the monsters legs. I let out an unearthly screech, before the Amerirose's glistening red blade cut across it's neck.

Sephiroth wondered over an offered him an approving nod. "We need to get moving before the sun dies."

"Yeah." Zack replied and scratched the back of his head. He looked over at the bodies of the monsters which laid in the snow. Steam still rose up from most of their wounds, and it wound about eerily in the air before dissipating.

Neither of them moved for a moment, and then Sephiroth simply took off without looking back at the melted reactor behind them. Zack followed behind, constantly unable to keep from glancing back at the tangled reactor.

* * *

Later in the day, maybe around noon they found themselves admit a flutter of snow. Sephiroth's keen eyes managed to point out a large cliff wall, and they strayed towards it hoping that maybe they would spot a cave or something close to shelter. And just as the snow started to really pick up into a blizzard Zack noticed a gapping hold in the cliff about forty feet off the ground. Sephiroth eyed it uneasily and slowly took his left hand away from the metal protruding from his ribs.

"Think you can make it."

"Yes." The reply didn't seem very confident, but there was no arguing with a general on any account. He then went about moving his right hand, it looked terribly painful and blood slowly started to pulse down from the wound along his arm. He frowned at it as if hoping it would just mystically heal up. And frankly, Zack thought, if he was a wound and had gotten a glare like that, he wouldn't have wasted any time bleeding.

The silver hared general finally flung himself into the air, and in a tricky looking maneuver he scrambled up the forty or so feet and into the cave. Looking back down at Zack he nodded. "I could have gone up there and check it out you know…" Zack murmured to himself before taking hold of some rock which stuck out at an odd angle and wrestling himself up the cliff face.

The cave itself was quite a bit more extensive then anything Zack had been expecting. "I think it's a Materia cave." Sephiroth said smoothly before wondering further in.

Zack watched him for a moment and then followed, feeling tried, worried and relieved all at the same time. He caught himself yawning after following Sephiroth off towards the right as the cave twisted back around on itself. And then took another few twists before entering a room filled with glowing light. It shocked Zack's consciousness right out of the abysmal state it had been in.

"Bright." He stated. "Camping in here sounds nice, except I wont be getting any sleep."

"There's another door way over there, if it twists around a bit more I suggest staying in there."

"Right." Zack wondered forward, no feeling quite appropriate letting the injured general go first. After all, it would hardly progress his record if he came back and Sephiroth didn't.

The pathway twisted around twice more before coming to a somewhat ragged end. Sephiroth nodded and flashed some fire magic back down the hallway which they came from. It served to heat the space up to a more conformable temperature.

Sephiroth sat down on the floor and pulled his dismantled trench coat off his shoulders. He glanced up at Zack who was still standing. "You can sit, I hardly think we'll be needing a watch."

"Righto." Zack replied and slumped down to the floor. He stared over at the general for a moment, and looked away feeling edgy for staring at the man. Sometimes the guy was just so inhuman that it was hard to look away. And now as Sephiroth prodded his own broken and bleeding arm, it certainly seemed to be one of those sort of moments.

"Your sure you don't have any sort of healing magic….?" Sephiroth asked again.

"Positive." Zack said leafing his fingers over the side of his Amerirose, five slots total, two having summon materia, one combo of fire and all, and a deathblow. His gauntlet only had a weak new ice that he was training, a shield and a quake.

Sephiroth sighed and ran a shaky finger down along his arm. After a moment he pulled his gloves off and leaned back against the wall. "How long have you been in Soldier?" He asked attempting small talk to pass some of the necessary time.

"Thirteen days."

"How very unlucky."

"Yeah, I've never been much up for the superstitions thought."

"Your from Gongaga correct?"

"Yeah…" He replied. "But I left."

"I see." Sephiroth shifted a bit, and then. "Thank you for your help. I'll see to it that this all goes into a promotion."

Zack grinned. "Thanks." Maybe being nice to monster wasn't quite disappointing after all.

Sephiroth nodded back and then closed his eyes. Zack watched him for a moment, just staring at him, and then finally shut his own eyes.

The soft sound of breathing echoed out of the room.

* * *

. 

A/N: I've always wanted to run thought how Zack and Sephiroth became such wonderful friends. And I figured I could start with a nice little incident. Any ideas for some intricate little missions for Zack and Seph to go on before the War starts would be appreciated.


	2. Crawling through the snow

Later in this chapter I'll be using ( and ) to signify someone's thoughts.

**Nothing To Do With Your History, Sir.**

Chapter 2 

Sephiroth awoke the next morning to see Zack piled up on the floor in a rather uncomfortable position. Every so often the poor guy would twitch and move a little. And then suddenly the man rolled over into the wall, and then bounced back. The green eyed general had never been one for humor, but seeing that ridiculous maneuver from a sleeping man did manage to bring a smile to his lips.

Taking a glance back down at his arm he noted that the wound had healed over nicely, into a massive glob of red. The metal protruding from his chest looked a lot less likely to cause him to die of blood loss if he pulled it out now. But he still refused to risk it, he'd seen plenty of people over the past two years bleed to death, and he didn't feel like joining them. Pulling himself slowly to his feet he felt a sting of pain as the little piece of metal scrapped against some organ inside him. He shrugged it off and head out into the materia room.

The glinting little pieces of materia glared at him, and carefully he started to each of the fully formed versions. He managed to find a pair of ices, one thunder, and miraculously enough a cure. Using it on his arm seemed like the best option until Zack woke up. And carefully he casted it. Normally the materia would have done very little, yet Sephiroth always did have a certain affinity for materia which few other's possessed. He supposed it had to do something with the fact that he had more mako in him then most humans did.

A little while later as he finished poking his arm back into heath with the materia Zack stumbled out into the room like he was in a drunken stupor or something.

"Sorry… all stiff." He murmured before looking my arm over. "Oh hey, yeah found some cure stuff out here?"

"I did."

"Awesome. Who knows, maybe I'll life to see that promotion." He fluffed his hair and blinked his eyes. "What about the shrapnel?"

"I was waiting for you to wake."

"I see." He shrugged, "well I'm all awaked now."

"Catch." Sephiroth said chucking the materia over Zack. "When I pulled it out, cast the strongest cure on me you can."

"Sure."

In an emotionless sort of way that really made Zack wonder how human his general was, Sephiroth plucked the shrapnel from his ribs, and Zack managed to cast the spell before even a tiny amount of blood poured out. Sephiroth looked up at the younger Soldier and nodded in approval. "I'm heading out to check on the weather, we need to leave by tomorrow."

"Defiantly inhuman." Zack murmured when the man was out of sight and hearing. He then proceeded to rub the side of his face an yawn. Back still aching he placed the cure materia into his sword instead of Leviathan. The summon seemed rather useless in a place where everything was already frozen water.

Sephiroth came sweeping back into the room, although he was still devoid of his trench coat. "The storm's lightened up, I think we should leave now.

"Alright." Zack gave him a nod and then followed him back into the room they had spend the night in to grab what little they had with them.

Zack followed Sephiroth through the sprinkling snow. A fresh layer of snow crunched beneath their feet, and puffs of breath appeared from their mouths in the cold temperature. A rip in Zack's cloak slowly became more an more irritating as it let the little heat he had out into the open air. He sighed and watched Sephiroth who walked with cat like grace in front of him.

The man maintained an unnatural grace constantly, which to Zack seemed particularly inhuman. The simple amount of inhuman qualities which Sephiroth kept up always interested Zack.

"I should make a list." He murmured to himself, and as if reading his thoughts Sephiroth turn and glared coolly into Zack's eyes.

"A list of what?"  
"Ah…. Just things to do when I get back to Midgar."

"Such as?"

"Well…" Zack rolled his hand while he thought of something he actually had to do. "Call Jonia is one thing, I have to apologize to her for leaving on this with out calling her first."

"She's your girlfriend?"

"Girl friend is a little extreme, more like fuck buddy really."

At that Sephiroth raised an eye brow, but didn't press the issue further.

(Well at least I know the guy's prude, after all it's not like he's interested in my sex life. Most people are… Sort of... That's kinda disturbing actually.) Zack let the thought trail off, and looked up ahead towards the mountains. He could swear he saw something up there that looked like a house.

"What is that General?"

"Icicle Inn, a small town, one of the only ones located this far north."

"Sweet, and here I thought we were just wondering around, sir."

"I happened to be very familiar with this area actually, seeing as I went over the air rout and other information." Sephiroth responded condescendingly, and Zack shrugged when his back turned.

"Have you ever been there before Soldier?" The general asked on a surprising run of talkativeness, at least for him.

"No, have you?"

"Not since I was much smaller. Professor Hojo brought me along when he visited this place around 16 years ago."

Zack did a quick piece of mental math and realized that Sephiroth would only have been five years old. "I didn't know you were associated with ShinRa when you were a child…?"

"I've always been with the company." He replied in a ruff and annoyed tone, Zack decided not to ask any further questions. He still wanted his pretty little promotion after all.

And then suddenly, "What about you, how long have you been working under ShinRa?"

"Ah… Well I'm twenty now, but originally I joined up at sixteen. It's been a little over four years."

"I noticed that you're the youngest Soldier in the program."

"Yes. Ah, my uncle Fencher Hardin recommended me for the program."

"Hardin is a somewhat reckless general. I'm surprised your not being run under him, surely you requested it."

"Ah, no. Actually I requested to be under you sir." He paused wondering if he should explain that his uncle had offered him a nice position in Nibelheim, some horribly boring town in the boonies of civilization. Worse yet the man had told him the new reactor being placed there would make everything quite exciting.

"Perhaps due to my past history?"

"Nothing to do with your history, sir. I would have been assigned to some boring town called Nibelheim if I had gone under him."

"Nibelheim?" Sephiroth asked quietly.

"Yes, it's located near a nasty patch of mountains where they're placing a new reactor. My uncle wanted to assign me there so I'd be, 'closer to home'."

"Which isn't exactly your priority."

"Not at all sir."

"I was born in Nibelheim." He stated calmly.

"Oh, well I'm sorry."

"I don't remember it at all so it's quite alright." Sephiroth found himself reassuring the man. "I know that my mother, Jenova, lived there. Gast, knew her and spoke of her once and a while before he disappeared… However out side of that there is little I know about my home town, after all I was being raised at ShinRa by the time I was one."

"Trust me your not missing much with the mother thing. My own practically wouldn't let me outside."

"I can imagine why."

"Hey." Zack grinned at the General's back, oddly enough the man was being far more conversational then he had ever seen before. "I'll have you know the reason she never let me out was due to the fact that I was a weak and sick little kid. I caught the flu every other say and every so often I'd break a bone or something."

"What a pity." Sephiroth stated with a hint of sarcasm.

They continued on as the day grew lighter clouds shifted from their position overhead to allow some sunlight through. The temperature rose to around freezing, which made the rest of the hike at least bearable.

As they marched on they encountered a total of two packs of the northern wolves, each Sephiroth zapped with his own mastered lightening materia.

The silence drew on until finally Zack, becoming annoyed with it, asked his general a question. "What about you sir? You get sick at all when you were little?"

"I was constantly sick, and still according to most, am." That was Sephiroth's disturbing reply.

"Ah well you never can trust those medical types, their always out to shove some more pills down your throat so they can make a few extra gold." Zack waved his hands about. "It always gets to me how they act so friggin superior."

"I'm not particularly fond of them myself."

The silence loomed again. Yet Zack managed to believe that he could hold out till they got to the tiny village.

AN: Don't you hate it when you get almost all of a chapter done, and then just can't finish off the last few pieces? It suckiths, and currently I'm going through that with almost every fic I'm writing. Ah well.


End file.
